January 21, 2005

"ALLAH FUBAR!!!"

The ad, a hoax viral ad not unlike last year's Ford Ka web ads that depicted a cat being beheaded and a pigeon being smacked into the street, is making it's way across the internet. The spot shows a man stepping out of a house in a nameless cosmopolitan European city and getting into a black VW Polo (a European-only sedan, similar to the American VW Golf).

After driving the Polo through the city, he stops in front of a sidewalk cafe packed with diners. Inside the car, you see that he is a suicide bomber with a bomb vest on and a detonator in his hand.

Outside the car again, the bomb detonates, and is completely contained within the car. A muffled "whumpf" sounds as the car remains intact. One diner looks up at the car casually.

The captioned tag reads, "Polo. Small but tough."

The ad plays on the established tagline for Volkswagen's Polo model, "small but tough". It shows a man in fatigues setting off in his Polo. He arrives outside a restaurant and pulls out a trigger. However, when he detonates the bomb, a flash is seen inside the car but the car itself does not explode. The strapline appears at the end. The campaign is the work of a duo known for their spoof advertising, called Lee and Dan. The pair run a website, LeeandDan.com, but the ad does not appear on the site at the time of writing. They have worked on a string of legitimate ads including Ford StreetKa, BP and Casio G-Shock, among others. Dan, from Lee and Dan, said: "The ad got out accidentally and has spread like wildfire. It wasn't meant for public consumption. "We think the spot reflects what people see in the news everyday, and in this instance the car is the hero that protects innocent people from someone with very bad intentions. We're sorry if the ad has caused any offence." Volkswagen stressed that the spot, which has been doing the viral email rounds this week, was made without any involvement from the company whatsoever. DDB London was also not involved in the spot.

It might be in bad taste, but as far as I'm concerned, it's certainly funny as hell!